


Torchwood After Hours

by CoolDudette



Category: Torchwood
Genre: Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Anxiety, Anxiety Attacks, Depression, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Heavy Angst, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Mental Anguish, Mental Breakdown, Mental Health Issues, Mental Instability, Panic Attacks
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-27
Updated: 2020-05-27
Packaged: 2021-03-03 04:20:58
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,094
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24408706
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CoolDudette/pseuds/CoolDudette
Summary: During the day Owen acts tough. He's a womanizer, a ladies man, immune to emotions and connections, unaffected by anything. But Jack knows the truth. The personality that Owen portrays is just his way of protecting himself from pain. Deep down his soul has been badly damaged by the death of his fiance, and he is a sweet, sensitive man with severe anxiety and depression. After every working day, Jack and Owen meet in Jack's office to talk through the day's events, to allow Owen to vent about whatever pent up emotions he has built up throughout the day.Each chapter will detail the aftermath of an episode of Torchwood.The premise is basically just an excuse for me to write a story that's pure hurt/comfort and angst.Jack and Owen are in an open relationship, allowing for Jack to flirt with Ianto and Owen to sleep around without either of them getting jealous.WARNING: mentions of mature themes such as violence, rape, grief, and mental illness. There may be graphic descriptions in Owen's flashbacks.SECOND WARNING: don't expect regular updates. I'll only have time to work on this when I'm ahead of schedule on both A Blue Hope and Iroh's Holiday.
Relationships: Jack Harkness/Owen Harper
Comments: 1
Kudos: 16





	Torchwood After Hours

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wanted the reader to be able to understand both Owen and Jack's point of view during these scenes, so this will be my first time attempting to write from a third person omniscient point of view (as opposed to my usual third person limited). I hope this doesn't make things too confusing for the reader. :)

This time Owen didn't even make it to Jack's desk before he collapsed. He fell to his knees on the hard linoleum floor and bent over, wrapping his arms about his head, sobbing. Suzie was dead. His best friend was dead. She'd shot herself.

The brick walls of Jack's office seemed to press in on him as he huddled on the floor. The harsh white light seemed unbearably bright. Where was Jack, what was taking him so long? Owen wanted to climb into his lap and cuddle him on his leather desk chair.

Jack, heading towards his office after seeing the new recruit out, saw Owen's silhouette collapse. He began running. Owen accumulated enough emotional baggage to deal with on a run-of-the-mill day. But now, with his best friend gone and in such a horrible way, Jack knew he would be on the verge of a panic attack.

When Jack burst in though the door, Owen was curled in a ball on the floor, hyperventilating. He looked so vulnerable, his arms shielding his face as though he expected someone to strike him.

"Hey," Jack knelt by Owen's side. "It's alright, sweetheart." He lifted Owen with his hands under his armpits, sitting him up against the back of his desk. Owen hung his head between his knees and choked on his sobs.

"Breathe." Jack placed his hands on the smaller man's shoulders and pushed him back against the desk. "Sit up and breathe, baby. Remember your exercises."

Owen gasped in a few breaths, but couldn't control his sobs, the shaking of his shoulders. He let out an incoherent moan.

"Are you gonna throw up?" Jack asked gently. It wasn't an uncommon occurrence, when Owen had a panic attack.

Owen shook his head, shuddering. His face shone with a sickly sheen of sweat.

"Let's get you cooled down, huh?" Jack knew that Owen often overheated during a panic attack. He pulled the slender man forward so that he could remove his leather jacket, and then pushed him back up against the desk. "Come on, baby, I need you to breathe."

Owen was still hyperventilating, growing red in the face, trying to fight his sobs. He squirmed as though in pain, cast his eyes to the ceiling. Every muscle was taught. His hands were clenched into tight fists.

"You cry if you need to," Jack said, "I've got you. You cry and scream all you want. Just make sure you _breathe."_

Owen gave himself over to his sobs. Jack pulled him tight against his chest, stroking his back as Owen emptied himself of tears. Gradually his shaking died down, and he was able to cling on to Jack and simply cry, gulping deep breaths in between tears. The effect of both the release of crying, and the deep breaths, was calming.

Jack waited patiently, simply holding on tight to the man he loved. He knew Owen wasn't ready to talk, or even listen. After a panic attack he usually had to just cry it out for a little while. This one had come on fast and hard, but was dissipating fairly quickly. Owen was almost better at dealing with severe emotional trauma than he was at dealing with every day emotions. Sometimes, when a panic attack built up very gradually after many hours of stress and frustration, it could take Jack all night to convince his lover to open up about it. This time, he sensed that Owen would be ready to talk soon.

He needed to finish crying first, though, so Jack didn't push him.

Eventually Owen was spent, and was simply leaning against Jack, almost asleep. Jack gathered him close and pulled the smaller man into his lap, then shuffled around to lean back against the wood of the desk, sitting where Owen had been.

"Are you ready to talk about it?" Jack asked.

Owen sniffed. "I don't know. Maybe."

"I'm so sorry for your loss. I know that you and Suzie were close."

Owen looked down at his hands, fidgeting in his lap. Jack knew that meant he wanted to say something but was having difficulty forcing it out.

"It's not just that she's dead," Owen whimpered. "She... killed herself."

Jack's arms tightened around him.

"Why would she do that?" Owen whispered.

"I suppose she knew that I was going to retcon her and didn't want to lose that much of her life," Jack replied.

"So she lost _all_ of her life instead?!"

"I can't pretend to understand her reasoning."

"She was a murderer! I was friends with her and she was a murderer! I shared pizza with someone whose hands were red with blood and I... I... I keep imagining her having literal blood on her hands, and smearing it on the pizza, and me eating it-" abruptly he gagged, putting his hands to his mouth.

"We can go to the bathroom if you're going to vomit," Jack suggested.

Owen swallowed and shook his head. "I'm okay."

"Okay is far from it," Jack sighed. "Suzie betrayed you. She lied to you, her best friend, about who she was and what she was capable of. I'm so sorry that you have to live with that."

"Why do I feel sorry for her?" Owen asked. "She was a bitch, she deserved to die!" He let out a sob. "Oh, God, that's a terrible thing to say, how could I say that?"

"Hush, shh, I know you don't mean it," Jack soothed, stroking his fingers through Owen's hair. "Panic attack blabber doesn't count, remember? And even if you did mean it... you're right. She was a serial killer. She had to be put down."

"I did the post mortem and put her body in the morgue," Owen moaned. "Just a few hours ago. And... dealing with the body of a loved one... it reminded me so much of Katie..." he let out a deep groan of anguish.

"If Suzie were alive I'd kill her myself for awakening such a painful memory," Jack breathed, pressing his lips to Owen's temple. "I'm always here if you want to talk about Katie."

Owen shook his head. "I want to forget her. Is that wrong of me? To not cherish her memory?"

"Not at all, it means that you still love her," Jack murmured. "The memory of her still makes you feel grief."

"Can we have... some sort of ceremony for Suzie, at Torchwood?" Owen asked. "To remember her? The good stuff, before that glove drove her crazy."

"Of course we can," Jack said, holding Owen close. "Anything for you."

  



End file.
